DOUBLY NONLINEAR PARABOLIC EQUATIONS INVOLVING VARIABLE EXPONENTS

This paper is concerned with doubly nonlinear parabolic equations involving variable exponents. The existence of solutions is proved by developing an abstract theory on doubly nonlinear evolution equations governed by gradient operators. In contrast to constant exponent cases, two nonlinear terms have inhomogeneous growth and some difficulty may occur in establishing energy estimates. Our method of proof relies on an efficient use of Legendre-Fenchel transforms of convex functionals and an energy method.